Salon published a piece today by Mary Elizabeth Williams called "I Have Your Results."
Williams is a regular columnist for Salon, often writing about cancer -- the general topic, and her own experiences with stage 4 melanoma. I think Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee, author of The Emperor of All Maladies, might be the best writer about cancer from a doctor's perspective that we have. But I nominate Williams as our best writer from a cancer patient's perspective. (Modesty would forbid me from nominating a certain someone else.)
Williams does a nice job of describing the emotional experience of having cancer, while also giving a larger scientific or cultural perspective. For example, in this piece, she discusses clinical trials and immunotherapy while also giving us a glimpse into getting a CT scan ("I had been at MSKCC just that morning, guzzling sickly sweet, room-temperature liquid and holding my breath inside the CT scan machine") and waiting for its results, and connecting to other patients, feeling their joy and pain, because you know just what they're going through.
This particular piece provides a nice mini-drama, the kind that good writers can pull off. There's a link at the end that will let you read more of Williams' stuff, which I recommend.
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